My talk was “The Daily Planet- An exploration of issues and opportunities arising as both the media and the environment enter a period of unprecedented and unpredictable change.”

When video is available, I’ll provide links. In the meantime, read on for the text I provided for translators (from which I diverted far too much; my apologies to them). You can also click here to read or download a copy including thumbnail versions of my slides.

The Daily Planet I’m speaking about today is not the newspaper where Superman worked.

It’s the world as we perceive it through media. And it’s hard to say which is changing more quickly – the global environment or the technologies and techniques that are used to convey the state of the world to the public.

Way back in the 20th century, things seemed so simple. News happened, reporters reported, and the front page of the New York Times or a trusted television anchorman said, “That’s the way it is.”

Part of the piece focuses on the communication challenges and opportunities facing the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. After the article was filed, the panel announced it was developing a new communication strategy along lines recommended by the world’s leading science academies. This is a step in the right direction, but without more resources from the 194 countries that sponsor the effort, I see scant prospect for concrete improvement.

The piece, “The Nerd Loop: Why I’m Losing Interest in Communicating Climate Change,” is a long disquisition on why there’s too much thumb sucking and circular analysis and not enough experimentation among institutions concerned about public indifference to risks posed by human-driven global warming. He particularly criticizes scientific groups, universities, environmental groups and foundations and other sources of funding. Randy summarized his points in a short “index card” presentation (in lieu of a Powerpoint) and followup interview on Skype (above). [Stephen McIntyre of Climateaudit has posted a response, entitled “The Smug Loop.“]

In our chat I admitted freely that I’ve stepped aboard the “nerd loop” on occasion on this blog, exploring humanity’s “blah, blah, blah, bang” habit when it comes to confronting certain kinds of risks. This goes for financial bubbles and tsunamis as well as long-term, long-lasting changes in the climate.

I agree with Olson, utterly, that there’s not enough experimentation, too much fear of failure and also far too much fear and misunderstanding at scientific institutions, from America’s universities to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, about the obligation and responsibility to engage the public in a sustained way. As I’ve put it here and elsewhere many times, it’s particularly important as traditional science journalism becomes a shrinking wedge of a growing pie of communication portals.

I encourage you to watch the video and/or read Olson’s provocative essay. You won’t agree with all of what he says. I don’t, and in fact I think that research revealing the human habit of embracing or ignoring information based on predispositions and emotion, not the information, is vitally important to convey (and needs to be conveyed more creatively, too!).

But I hope you’ll recognize the merits in Olson’s argument. Here’s the summary of the “Nerd Loop” essay: Read more…

5:45 p.m. | Updated below
I spent 48 hours at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science last weekend and will be sporadically posting a string of observations on themes and discussions related to smoothing the human journey. I’ll also post, as a resource, a set of summaries and links related to notable sessions that I was unable to attend.

First stop, climate (mis)communication.

Two sessions explored a focal point of this blog, the interface of climate science and policy, and the roles of scientists and the media in fostering productive discourse.

Both discussions homed in on an uncomfortable reality — the erosion of a longstanding presumption that scientific information, if communicated more effectively, will end up framing policy choices.

The discussion didn’t really provide many answers, but did reveal the persistent frustrations of some scientists with the way the media cover their field. Sparks flew between Kerry Emanuel, a climatologist long focused on hurricanes and warming, and Seth Borenstein, who covers climate and other science for the Associated Press.

Lessl, a relative newcomer to considering climate communication, had what I consider the most profound observations. You can read his full prepared remarks at a link at the end of this post. Read more…

I speak about climate, the media and humanity’s growth spurt at many universities, sometimes by Skype, sometimes in person. Earlier this year I gave the Johnston Lecture for the journalism program at the University of Oregon and just noticed that the video — with my slides nicely edited in — is viewable online.

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For those here who have concerns about the responsibilities and limitations of journalists covering climate and related issues, the talk could be illuminating, and/or exasperating.

I explore the tyrannies of the newsroom — the the tyrannies of (not enough) time and space, the bane of balance, the lure of the font-page thought. I describe how global warming remains the antithesis of news as we know it. As I say:

The front page is about now…. Global warming is fundamentally, and will remain for a long time to come, not like that.

I talk about Kerry Emanuel and Chris Landsea, researchers of hurricanes and climate: “They’re really good, responsible scientists. They’re not paid by Exxon or Greenpeace. And they have completely divergent views over what’s happening with hurricanes in a warming world.”

A reporter in a hurry can build a story on a new study of hurricanes and warming by calling each, exploiting the dictum that for every Ph.D. there is an equal and opposite Ph.D. But that just promotes confusion by focusing on conflict and not the established knowledge that is not in dispute. As I explain, “Unless you can fit in the context, you end up with what I call whiplash journalism. Coffee causes cancer. Coffee is great for your sex life.”

Specialized journalists now occupy a shrinking wedge of a fast-growing pie of light-speed media. This reality threatens to erode the already limited public appreciation of science. But the situation also presents a great opportunity – and responsibility – for scientists, their institutions, and their funders. Institutions that thrive in this world of expanding, evolving communication paths are those willing to engage the public (including critics) and to experiment with different strategies. The alternative is to hunker down, wait for misinformation to spread, and then – after the fact – sift fact from hype. Read the rest…

When I was starting out in science journalism in the early 1980s, a writer had three choices to begin reporting a story. You could go to your publication’s wall of dusty encyclopedias of professional and scientific associations, phone directories and other reference tomes lining the walls (in my case, at Science Digest magazine). You could raid a more experienced colleague’s Rolodex. Or you could call the Scientists Institute for Public Information, S.I.P.I, a nonprofit group founded in 1963 and mainly paid for by media companies and foundations to provide, in essence, directory assistance for journalists seeking scientists.

These days, a journalist, or anyone else, can in seconds find heaps of scientists studying glaciology or marine mammal endocrinology or the toxicity of petroleum with a mouse click. But finding someone who’s reliable and appropriate for a particular piece is a tougher challenge.

If academic and professional institutions with lots of expertise on scientific issues of great import shy away from the public arena, they leave that space to other groups that may put some background agenda ahead of accuracy.

Note that the geophysical union is offering up experts expressly in climate science, not policy, which is outside the research focus of its members for the most part. Here’s the group’s news release: Read more…

Louis Psihoyos, the former National Geographic photographer who won an Oscar on Sunday for “The Cove,” his first documentary film, sat down for a conversation with me at the Asia Society on Tuesday on various aspects of the ongoing slaughter of dolphins in Japan and his team’s work exposing the serving of Sei whale meat at The Hump, a sushi restaurant in Santa Monica, Calif. Here’s video of the discussion:

Among other things, Mr. Psihoyos predicted that Japan would be more likely to shut down the seasonal capture and killing of thousands of dolphins because of the human health implications of eating dolphin meat — which the film shows is laced with high levels of mercury — than because of complaints about cruelty in the killing of the marine mammals, which the film captures in wrenching detail.

“I don’t think we are going to win this issue in Japan on an animal rights issue,” he said. “To me, we are going to win it on the humanitarian reasons. It is a crime against humanity when people are serving poison as food.”

He also discussed the connection between the dolphin killing and the booming worldwide business of marine mammal shows at aquariums and zoos that prompts the dolphin roundups in the first place (the animals that are killed are those not bought in auctions for live dolphin shows). Read more…

About

By 2050 or so, the human population is expected to pass nine billion. Those billions will be seeking food, water and other resources on a planet where humans are already shaping climate and the web of life. Dot Earth was created by Andrew Revkin in October 2007 -- in part with support from a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship -- to explore ways to balance human needs and the planet's limits.